Thank you!

Storytelling has been well recognized as a basic human need, serving as a framework to express our views on ourselves and the world around us, give meaning to our lives and immortalize our memories. Storytelling, like learning, can only happen in social and affective settings, giving us the ability to change through verbalization, communication, creation and is a prerequisite to developing empathy and compassionate community action.

Today’s world, full of digital media and information overload on the one hand and, multiple crises of all sorts on the other, presents a double challenge for digital storytelling: to put digital media at the service of first-person stories, that can be told in a much more interactive manner, reposited in digital memory banks and eventually reach a wider audience; and, at the same time, to put storytelling at the service of creative action and solidary change, as the ultimate response to the crises currently tantalizing economies, societies, and the environment.

The Digital Storytelling in Times of Crisis conference aspires to bring forward digital storytelling projects and efforts that provide new and engaging responses to the above themes and challenges. The conference will include keynote speeches, paper presentations, panels and workshops on all aspects of digital storytelling, plus screenings and exhibitions of digital stories. Emphasis will be placed on research and stories that bring forward digital storytelling as an effective response to crises at all levels.

The Digital Storytelling in Times of Crisis conference is organized in Athens, Greece, during May 8-10, 2014, by the Laboratory of New Technologies in Communication, Education and the Mass Media and the University Research Institute of Applied Communication of the University of Athens and the collaboration of the Hellenic American Union.